Defunct company headed by Bruce Haines ordered to pay $22K

Bruce Haines

After locking horns in court over cash owed on his failed 2010 election bid, one-time Brampton mayoral candidate Bruce Haines is in legal hot water again, this time with former employees of a defunct security business who say they’re owed thousands of dollars.

After locking horns in court over cash owed on his failed 2010 election bid, one-time Brampton mayoral candidate Bruce Haines is in legal hot water again, this time with former employees of a defunct security business who say they’re owed thousands of dollars.
Ontario’s Ministry of Labour has leveled several ordinances against Independent Protection Services (IPS), a security and loss prevention firm once run by Haines.
The orders relate to unpaid wages, vacation pay, termination pay, holiday pay, and overtime. So far, investigators have wrapped up 30 claims filed by IPS employees who were left in the lurch when the company folded last year.
The ministry also confirmed that staff is currently looking into more claims against IPS for violations under Ontario’s Employment Standards Act.
The total dollar figure for claims resolved against IPS and Independent Investigation Services, another company associated with Haines, is $22,092, according to information provided by the ministry.
Amounts owed are broken down as follows:
•$7,200 unpaid wages
•$4,318 vacation pay
•$1,307 public holiday pay
•$2,896 overtime pay
•$6,371 termination pay
In response, Haines said he feels sorry for those employees impacted by the demise of IPS, but stressed he is not ultimately liable for those lost wages.
“As much as I’d like to personally go and pay these guys … I personally cannot accept that liability,” Haines said. “I get the fact that there are a handful of people that are frustrated. A couple of them are really decent people that I feel bad for.”
“They (employees) didn’t work for me,” Haines added. “They worked for a corporation. It’s an incorporated company. It is its own entity. I was just one of a number of shareholders or owners in the business.”
It isn’t clear who these other shareholders or owners are.
When asked to provide names of shareholders Haines said he wasn’t comfortable revealing private information.
Haines went on to deem others responsible for running the company into the ground.
The economic downturn slowed business down in recent years, but Haines asserts that the failure of the once profitable business also boiled down to others’ mismanagement.
Haines ran IPS as a director but left the operations to other associates for part of 2011 and most of 2012 while he pursued another business opportunity in Africa. Haines represents a company that develops biofuel technology and traveled to Africa to secure contracts.
Haines alleges that in his absence, those charged with running operations faltered in their responsibilities and basically destroyed the company.
“In September our licence came up for renewal. We didn’t renew it. We just shut down the operations because it was just too much,” said Haines, noting that by the time he returned from business dealings in Africa the company was in shambles.
Haines asserts that a former manager, Thomas Doyle, lost key contracts (including a $2 million contract with HBC) that would have helped IPS out of a financial hole.
Further, when Doyle decided to quit IPS to join a competitor in January 2012, he took with him vital accounts and employees and exposed confidential information about the company.
Much of these allegations put forth by Haines played out in front of a judge last year.
An injunction was filed against Doyle and other former employees for breaching a shareholders agreement that prevented them from siphoning business to a rival firm.
The injunction sought restitution for financial losses incurred by their alleged actions.
However, in court documents obtained by The Guardian, Haines testified that the loss prevention industry is competitive with many customers and employees moving back and forth.
He also acknowledged — to the detriment of his case — that IPS was still profitable despite “alleged breaches of the defendants.”
As such, the judge ruled against IPS arguing Haines could not show the company suffered “irreparable harm” as a result of Doyle and others leaving for a competitor.
Doyle says he was awarded more than $19,000 as a result of that judgment for incurred legal fees — cash that he says Haines still owes.
A long-term employee of IPS, Doyle said the company was in trouble long before Haines left for Africa.
He said payroll issues became frequent in recent years with employees not getting paid on time or missing portions of their wages.
As payroll and cash flow issues mounted it became apparent to him that the company was in trouble, said Doyle, adding Haines became an absentee boss and left managers to deal with employee issues.
“The company was just falling apart,” Doyle said.
One employee, Martino Zagordo, said he racked up 227 hours of booked work he didn’t get paid for.
In November, the Ministry of Labour awarded Zagordo $11,000 (including administrative costs) following an investigation into wages owed. The ruling, obtained by The Guardian, states, “the employer was asked to voluntarily comply with the assessed payment but has not done so” and “therefore an order to pay has been issued.”
Linda Jansen, an IPS regional manager responsible for southwestern Ontario, said it got to the point where payroll was three weeks behind. Jansen said by summer 2012 she was overwhelmed with employee requests for pay.
It’s been a tough year for Haines on the legal front.
Last July, a superior court judge ordered Haines to pay $48,686 plus nearly $17,500 in lawyer fees to his 2010 election campaign manager Rui Branco.
In October 2011, Branco filed suit against Haines, the runner-up for the top job in Brampton’s last municipal election, over costs he incurred during the campaign.
Branco confirmed with The Guardian that he still hasn’t received cash awarded in the settlement.
Meanwhile, former employees are attempting to turn up the heat on Haines for unpaid wages.
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